The Appreciation Game

Have you ever noticed that when someone is feeling badly about themselves, no matter how much you tell them they’re beautiful, great, and loved, they still can’t seem to believe it?

In coaching thousands of people on The Passion Test™ over the years, we’ve learned there is a direct correlation between doubting your ability to fulfill and live out your passions and having low self-esteem. You rarely find one without the other. What accompanies low self-esteem is the belief that “I am not worthy and therefore I can’t possibly fulfill my dreams.”

The “how” of living your passions is the result of being aligned with the flow of natural laws, and your “higher-self.” The way I was able to find my higher self was through what Chris and I call, “The Appreciation Game.”

Free Yourself with the Appreciation Game

For years I suffered from low self-esteem. I could go into all of the reasons why, but in the spirit of being proactive I’d rather share with you a tool my friend Marie Diamond suggested to me many years ago that truly helped transform the way I saw myself.

Every day I would review what I had done that day and somehow find something I appreciated about myself. It didn’t matter if it seemed minor, silly, or obsolete. The exercise was to find something I could appreciate about myself, no matter what. At first this exercise wasn’t so easy. I began to see why I had allowed myself to play the victim all these years, and realized it had been enabling me to:

• Get people’s attention
• Get their sympathy
• Give up
• Feel unworthy
• And the list went on…

Pretty scary stuff, wouldn’t you agree? The Appreciation Game was exactly what I needed to begin kicking my low self-esteem addiction, and begin focusing on my passions and achievements instead.

How You Can Play the Game and Enhance Your Self-Esteem

You can play this game on your own or with a partner (it’s really fun to play it with a partner who truly loves and appreciates you).

On your own, sit for a few minutes at the end of the day or first thing in the morning. Make a list of at least 10 things you appreciate about yourself, what you accomplished that day, or wins that showed up in your life that day. Don’t repeat any of the things that were on your list on previous days.

Do this every day for a week and see how you’re feeling about yourself. You’ll get the greatest benefit when you write out your lists.

Put Your Attention on Your Achievements

Not only does writing down your accomplishments and achievements allow you to actually see all the great things you have done, and your mind will begin to reverse the self-deprecating talk that prevents you from realizing your dreams.

If you are playing the Appreciation Game with a partner, prepare to have some fun. Take turns. You find one thing you appreciate about the other and let them know. Then the other person takes their turn to find something they love about you. Do this ten times.

Now do another round, except this time each person says one thing they appreciate about themselves, and they can’t repeat anything that has already been said.

Notice how you feel after playing the Appreciation Game — about yourself and about your partner.

When you are able to free yourself from low self-esteem, your possibilities are truly endless. Give your attention to what you do right, to your wins, to the things you do well. You will find your improvement is faster and much greater than when you try to fix your mistakes.

With love

Janet Bray Attwood